THE  LIBRARY  OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

NORTH  CAROLINA 


THE  COLLECTION  OF 
NORTH  CAROLINIANA 


C378 

UK3 
1895 


UNIVERSITY  OF  N.C.  AT  CHAPEL  HILL 


00039136693 


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Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

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University  of  North  Carolina  at  Chapel  Hill 


http://www.archive.org/details/newuniversityoraOOelle 


Tfit   NEW  UNIVERSITY, 

AN  ORATIOE^ 
VERED  BY  ADOLPHUS  HILL  ELLER, 

AT   THE 

LJNDREDTH    ANNUAL    COMMENCEMENT 

OF  THE 

rVERSlTT  OF  NORTH  CAROLINA, 
JxjLin.&  fitlr:i,  1895. 


the:  new  university. 


For  a  hundred  years  on  this  gracious  day  our  State 
has  o-athered  here  its  learning*,  its  beauty  and  its 
chivalry;  here  a  University  was  christened  at  the 
constitutional  altar,  and  here  dedicated  by  the  public 
voice;  here  the  Arts  have  come  on  the  pilgrimag-e  of 
their  hope,  and  here  laid  down  the  trophies  of  their 
triumphs;  Music  has  celebrated  it  in  patriotic  song"; 
Eloquence  has  thrown  over  it  the  enchanted  spell; 
Society  has  lig-hted  its  features  with  happiness  and 
love;  Architecture  has  clothed  it  in  stately  raiment; 
and  over  all  Relig^ion  has  raised  its  consecrated  hands; 
and  for  a  hundred  3^ears  the  blessing's  of  heaven  have 
borne  witness  to  the  pleasure  of  Him  whose  name 
enlig'htens  the   world. 

Hitherto  the  men,  whose  eloquence  has  lifted  them 
to  this  loft}^  place  and  g-jven  them  the  ear  of  the  State, 
have  had  recourse  to  the  history,  the  traditions,  the 
fond  and  tender  memories  of  a  past,  g-lorious,  but 
forever  g'one.  It  was  an  inspiration  that  g'ave  us  to- 
day the  heir-apparent  to  "The  exhaustless  splendors 
of  those  g"lorious  days, "  the  most  g-ifted  son  of  our 
Alma  Mater,  an  acknowledged  master  in  the  domain 
of  Olympic  thoug-ht,  whose  lips  have  been  touched 
with  the  honey  of  H3'bla,  to  fashion  into  the  best  ex- 
pression the  best  thought  of  the  University  of  the 
aJ  past,  to  make  this  last  act  in  our  century-drama  a 
^.  thrilling-  climax  to  a  lofty  theme,  and  from  the  furnace 
of  his  heart,  send  the  warm  and  g-lowing  current  of 
his-thougfht  throbbine  throus'h  the  world.* 


*& 


*  Hon.  Alfred  Moore  Waddell  who  had  just  delivered  the  oration 
upon  "The  Old  University". 


My  stature  forbids  that  I  should  touch  those  hig-h 
and  holy  thing's;  my  subject  impels  me  forward,  not 
backward.  I  shall  enter  upon  no  encomium  of  the 
New  University — it  needs  none.  It  needs  friends,  not 
flatterers — work,  not  words.  To-day  we  forg-e  the 
g"lowing"  link  that  binds  century  to  centur}^  With  a 
spirit,  willing"  alike  to  acknowledg^e  blessing's  won  by 
our  ancestors  and  to  win  blessing's  for  posterity,  with 
reverent  hands  and  consecrated  hearts  we  have  met 
to  place  upon  those  foundations  which  our  fathers 
laid,  stone  on  stone,  thus  securing"  for  ourselves  that 
immortality  which  awaits  the  builders  of  this  temple. 
"They  wroug"ht  mightily  to  shape  vag"ue  hopes  into 
gfreat  events".  Fresh  from  King^'s  Mountain  and 
Guilford  and  Yorktown,  with  the  mig"ht3^  passion  of 
liberty  throbbing"  in  their  hero-hearts,  here  in  the 
solitude  and  shadow  of  a  primeval  forest  they  set  the 
beacon  of  learning".  It  g"rew  brighter  and  higher  like 
the  rising"  sun,  till  the  silence  and  sadness,  the  dread 
and  darkness  of  nig"ht  hovered  about  it, — but  it  was 
not  night.  From  the  storm-swept  sky  it  flashed  forth 
at  length  and  the  shadows  fled  and  still  flee  toward 
the  west. 

It  was  a  new  birth  symbolized«by  baptism  in  martyr- 
blood.  And  with  it  was  born  a  new  civilization.  The 
mig"hty  fabric  of  feudal  society  which  valor  and  policy 
had  founded  on  our  rich  and  ample  plains  made  here 
its  last  stand  ag"ainst  the  all-conquering"  new-world 
idea  of  universal  liberty,  universal  education,  and  uni- 
versal opportunity.  It  went  down  before  the  armies 
of  the  North,  whose  numbers  and  whose  martial  energ"}^ 
were  irresistible. 

By  the  arbitrament  of  war  our  constitution' was 
shattered  and  shaped  anew.  Most  of  the  old  was 
rejected;  but  the  mandate  of    1776    which  created  this 


University  came  forward,  "Clearer,  broader,  bolder 
than  before".  Seven  times  has  it  g-one  back  to  the 
people  who  g-ave  it  through  the  white  heat  of  party 
passion  and  seven  times  unharmed  as  the  Hebrew 
children,  it  has  stood  forth  in  shining-  characters  upon 
the  enchanted  parchment  of  our  Constitution;  and 
there  it  now  stands,  and  there  it  will  forever  stand, 
as  a  "Hinderance  and  a  rebuke"  to  him  who  would 
thwart  the  will  of  the  toiling-,  ruling;  myriads  of  the 
State. 

During-  that  dim,  desperate  decade,  from  '65  to  '75, 
like  a  mother  stricken  and  stripped  of  her  first  born, 
these  shadow-haunted  halls  stood  here  in  mute  appeal 
to  heaven,  waiting-  through  those  sad  and  desolate 
years  and  listening- — for  the  footsteps  of  the  dead. 
Spartan-like  they  came  at  length  upon  their  shields, 
borne  hither  by  their  loving-  comrades  to  live  forever 
in  marble  and  in  the  memory  of  men. 

Doubtful  yet  undismayed  a  few  men  with  the  pittance 
of  the  impoverished,  entered  upon  and  persisted  in  a 
movement,  in  the  face  of  ancient  prejudice,  political 
indifference  and  sectarian  hinderance  to  rebuild  this 
University  in  the  hearts  of  the  people.  History  was 
not  wanting  in  examples  of  similar  foresight  and  for- 
titude. Prussia  entered  the  19th  century  with  the 
fell  fo:  t  of  Napoleon  on  her  flag.  Out  of  the  wreck- 
age of  her  ruined  redoubts  she  builded  her  Universi- 
ties, and  the  same  century  has  seen  her  troops  at 
Sedan,  her  scholars  at  every  university  that  encircles 
the  globe,  herself  the  leader  of  Kurope,  the  intellect- 
ual center  of  the  world, — dazzling  all  eyes  with  the 
fresh  bloom  of  her  scholarship  and  culture. 

The  first  care  of  the  ancient  state  was  to  educate 
the  ruling  class.  To  that  class  to-day  belongs  every- 
one who  bears  the  imag-e  of  his    Maker    and  wears  the 


majesty  of  freedom.  Twin-born  with  universal  suf- 
frag-e  is  universal  education.  The  eighteenth  century 
conceived,  the  nineteenth  century  brought  forth  and 
the  twentieth  century  must  rear  to  manhood  this  child 
of  the  new  world,  or  bury  the  hopes  of  free  institutions 
in  the  virg-in  soil  which  g^ave  them  birth. 

To  conserve  and  to  consecrate  the  truest  traditions 
and  yet  to  break  away  from  narrow  channels  and  time 
worn  paths  of  the  past;  to  teach  a  State  to  think  for 
itself,  and  feed  its  own  mind  and  heart  with  the  latest 
and  g"randest  results  of  science;  to  cancel  all  liens  of 
party,  sect  and  class;  to  disabuse  the  idea  that  higher 
education  is  a  luxury  for  an  imaginary  higher  class; 
and  to  offer  a  clear  title  to  equal  opportunity  to  the 
"Ivowly  born  and  gentle  bred,"  to  the  sons  of  the 
mechanic  and  the  millionaire;  to  bring  the  University 
in  touch  with  the  people,  make  it  popular  and  poten- 
tial; and  through  normal  instruction,  lectures,  travels, 
tears  and  prayers;  and  by  dedicating-  the  best  talent 
to  the  intellectual  awakening-  of  the  people;  take  its 
place  at  the  head  of  public  education;  send  forth  an 
army  of  teachers,  print  and  publish  and  scatter  thick 
as  snow  flakes  in  a  winter  storm  the  results  of  this 
work, — until  the  lanterns  of  heaven  grow  dim,  and  the 
east  grows  gray  and  we  behold  the  "Upg-lowing-  day 
from  the  bosom  of  the  nig-ht:" — this  problem  worked 
out  into  life  and  law  is  an  achievement  transcendently 
greater  than  that  which  our  gfray  fathers  compassed 
at  the  g-enesis  of  this  state.  We  know  what  masters 
wrought  this  task — Phillips,  Hooper,  Mangum,  Graves 
— "Named  softly  as  the  household  names  of  those 
whom  God  has  taken".  And  what  has  Kemp  P. 
Battle  been  to  Chapel  Hill!  More  than  any  other 
man.  With  the  triple  lever  of  his  g^reat  head  and 
heart  and  hand  he    has   uplifted    and    pushed  forward 


this  state.  Time  only  can  compass  and  consecrate  the 
fulness  of  his  martyr-zeal  and  patriot-valor. 

But  the  New  University,  was  not,  is  not  accomplish- 
ed. It  is  more  than  the  life  of  one  man  or  of  two. 
New  epochs  call  for  new  efforts,  and  the  opening-  day 
bring"s  fresh  energ-ies.  The  University  has  but  awaken- 
ed the  people, — now  to  the  task  of  their  enlig-htenment. 
To  fashion  existing  methods,  to  meet  existing-  needs; 
teach  that  g^reater  than  politics  and  pleasure  are  pur- 
pose and  power;  gfive  thougfht  its  ideas,  morals  their 
ideals,  life  its  character;  receive  the  flower  of  youth, 
g"ive  back  the  rich  fruitag-e  of  manhood;  make  man  mas- 
ter of  himself,  servant  to  humanity;  show  wealth  its 
opportunity  to  do  gfood;  g'ive  student  life  its  true  rela- 
tion and  responsibility  to  the  world;  teach  the  broad- 
est culture  and  expect  the  grandest  results. 

The  University  idea  is  broader  than  sect,  section,  or 
party  motive, — it  is  as  broad  as  life  and  embraces  all 
nature.  Such  is  the  spirit  of  the  New  University, 
which  the  energ-y  and  enthusiasm  of  our.  new  president 
has  quickened  into  animation  and  to  ardor.  In  this 
thrill  of  modern  learning",  this  migfhty  torrent  of  swell- 
ing- thoug-ht,  he  has  had  the  presence  and  the  boldness 
to  breast  its,  wave.  By  embodying-  the  spirit  of  the 
New  South,  by  re-org-anization,  by  expansion,  by  ath- 
letics, by  societies,  by  co-operation,  by  endowment,  by 
appeals  to  the  people,  by  every  leg-itimate  means  of 
culture  and  growth,  and  by  selection  of  the  fittest  of 
all  methods,  and  adaptation  to  the  wants  of  North  Car- 
olina, he  has  in  this  the  fourth  year  of  his  administra- 
tion, distanced  the  high  record  of  the  past  and  made 
this,  what  it  never  was  before,  a  University  of  the  peo- 
ple, by  the  people  and  for  the  people.  The  New  Uni- 
versity creates  and  is  itself  created  by  the  uprising  tide 
of  our    prosperity.     Already    it   holds  a   commanding 


place  in  the  south-east  of  our  republic.  Let  the  mu- 
nificence of  the  public,  let  private  philanthropy  unfet- 
ter the  holy  ambition  of  our  enlig-htened  leader  and  he 
shall  not  lay  down  his  task  till  we  have  here  the  Har- 
vard of  the  South. 

The  real  University  has  manv  types— rit  has  but  one 
spirit.  It  was  kindled  in  the  twelfth  century  at  St. 
Genevieve,  where  Abelard  tauo-ht  that  "Authority  is 
derived  from  reason."  Men  started  up  and  enquired; 
and  thrilled  by  the  throb  of  liberated  thought,  follow- 
ed him  in  banishment  to  the  wilderness,  and  there 
about  his  stubble-built  oratory  founded  a  republic  of 
liberty  and  letters.  The  past  rose  up  and  instructed 
men  with  the  tong-ues  of  Cicero  and  Homer.  The  mas- 
ter-minds which  had  enlig"htened  one  ag"e  broke  the 
darkness  of  another;  fervent  hearts  called  for  an  open 
Bible,  and  in  the  mirror  of  revelation  and  reason  man 
beheld  in  his  own  imag-e  the  likeness  of  his  God,  The 
ideal  was  found.  To  clothe  man  with  liberty  and 
learning'  and  to  crown  him  with  religion  has  from  that 
day  till  our  own  given  to  the  University  its  aim  and  its 
importance. 

The  old  world  school  admitted  the  citizen  to  this 
high  estate;  the  new  world  school  admits  all,  not  de- 
g-rading  the  citizen  but  ennobling  the  man, — a  principle 
which  has  expanded  day  by  day  and  century  by  cen- 
tury since  Columbus  from  his  frail  caravel  looked  out 
upon  a  continent  fruitful  of  all  thing's,  save  only  of 
tyranny  and  oppression. 

The  stern  Puritan,  the  faithful  Covenanter,  the 
peace-loving-  Friend  following-  the  career  of  William 
Penn,  the  earnest  simple  souls  who  shared  with  Rog-er 
Williams  faith  in  absolute  soul-freedom,  and  they  who 
gazed  at  John  Wesley  "As  men  gaze  at  a  star,"  rush- 
ed to  these  shores,  and  each  built  its  University  upon 


the  foundation  of  its  creed.  They  little  knew,  and 
without  a  prophet's  foresigfht  could  not  have  known, 
that  2^  free  state  could  found  and  foster  a  system  of  ed- 
ucation upon  the  surest  support,  the  widest  wisdom, 
and  the  truest  toleration.  But  the  years  were  full  of 
wisdom  suited  to  the  times. 

Of  the  thirteen  original  states  but  six  entered  the 
Union  with  the  University  mandate  in  their  constitu- 
tions. North  Carolina,  abreast  with  Pennsylvania,  led 
the  way.  Since  1790  every  State  has  followed  in  their 
wake.  Here  ag-ain  in  1825  is  found  the  first  statute 
establishing-  state  supervision,  and  asserting-  state 
control  over  elementary  education.  "Noble  beg-inning-s 
in  the  rig-ht  direction!"  A  precedent  alrfeady  passed 
into  fundamental  law  and  followed  by  the  unbroken 
line  of  forty-iive  American  States,  as  they  sweep  across 
this  spreading-  republic,  planting-  universal  education 
in  the  fresh  fields  of  freedom  under  the  clear  sky  of 
peace,  where  in  God's  appointed  time  must  come  to  ful- 
ness and  to  ripeness  the  best  civilization  of  this  earth. 

The  history  of  nations  is  marked  by  revolutions, 
churches  by  reformations,  subject  alike  to  the  same 
divine  law  of  chang-e  and  prog-ress.  At  the  founding* 
of  this  commonwealth  the  church  yielded  a  ready  as- 
sent to  state  support  and  state  control  of  hig-Jier  edu- 
cation. To  the  family  and  to  itself  belong-ed  the  rest. 
Before  the  meridian  of  the  first  century  had  been  reach- 
ed the  burden  of  lower  education  was  laid  upon  the 
strong-  arm  of  the  mother  state  and  her  rig-ht  to  the 
hig-her  disputed!  'Tis  the  whim  of  the  child;  no  wise 
parent  will  heed  it.  We  are  advancing-  to  a  hig-her 
view  of  the  state  and  its  functions  and  duties.  Pub- 
lic sentiment  is  steadily  and  sturdily  settling  down  to 
the  conviction  that  the  methods  and  measures  of  the 
past  have  been  outgrown,  that  the  irregular,  the  tern- 


8 

porary,  the  local  must  give  way  to  the  regular,  the 
permanent,  the  universal — that  there  should  be,  that 
there  musl  be  a  unity,  a  sequence,  an  organized  con- 
nection between  the  lowest  and  the  highest.  And 
when  the  sovereign  people  awake  to  full  consciousness 
that  the  highest  and  best  in  education  is,  in  this  way 
and  this  way  only,  opened  to  them,  they  will  have  it 
so.  Upon  this  true  historic  basis  they  w^ill  build, 
where  the  aristocracy  of  scholars  shall  serve  the  de- 
mocracy of  workers,  where  independence  of  thought 
and  expression  shall  expand  and  tower  beyond  and 
above  the  narrow  confines  of  class  and  creed,  where 
the  truest  expression  of  the  religion  of  the  people  shall 
dwell  and  be  heard,  where  faith  and  reason  shall  re- 
flect along  the  pathway  of  our  race  the  true  light  that 
comes  direct  from  the  throne  .of  God. 

The  prog'ress  of  North  Carolina  towards  this  ideal 
has  been  slow,  but,  thank  God,  it  has  been  substantial 
and  true.  If  I  may  point  you  to  an  example  with 
which  I  am  most  familiar,  to  the  cit^^i»Winston,  which 
of  all  our  cities  I  know  best  and  love  best,  you  will 
look  upon  a  scene  in  which  are  blended  the  power  of 
progress  and  the  poetry  of  pathos.  The  old  Academy, 
once  vocal  with  the  light  laughter -of  youth,  now  sur- 
rendered to  the  manufacturer,  and  the  boys'  and  girls' 
play  grounds  given  over  to  the  printing  house  and  the 
church.  But  away  to  the  north  and  the  east  and  the 
west,  crowning  each  swelling  hill-top,  stand  the  state- 
ly structures  of  her  public  graded  schools,  free  to  all — 
freest  to  the  humblest — stretching  from  the  Kinder- 
garten to  the  University  a  ladder  of  learning,  and 
leading  a  rising  generation  up  its  shining  rounds  to  a 
clearer  view  and  a  wider  vision  of  man's  dread  destiny 
and  duty. 

The   awful  waste  of  splendid  human  faculties   de- 


mands  that  some  such  unity  and  system  shall  make  its 
way  to  the  town,  the  hamlet  and  the  county.  External 
change  and  progress  cannot  long-  be  held  and  hindered 
by  the  aifections  of  successive  generations  for  the  old. 
The  law  of  our  nature  has  decreed  it — as  well  resist 
the  relentless,  heedless  pitiless  winds  which  wrestle 
with  the  weather-worn  bark  on  the  great  deep  with- 
out. 

Dare  we  leave  to  charity  and  to  chance-what  our  Con- 
stitution commands  and  the  wisdom  and  the  wants  of 
the  age  compel?  "Is  it  right,  is  it  expedient,  is  it  pos- 
sible," for  the  State  to  provide  the  highest  as  well  as 
the  lowest  in  education?  Napoleon  Bonaparte  designed 
this  system  for  France,  Alexander  Hamilton  engrafted 
it  upon  the  constitution  of  New  York,  Thomas  Jeffer- 
son planted  it  securely  in  the  commonwealth  of  Virgin- 
ia, Prince  Bismarck  said,  '  'It  is  the  one  thing  upon  which 
we  can  aiford  to  be  lavish."  The  four  greatest  intel- 
lects of  two  continents  and  two  centuries,  representing 
the  monarchal,  the  imperial,  the  republican,  the  dem- 
ocratic schools  of  thought — higher  authority  must  come 
through  revelation.  'Tis  a  time  for  the  revolutionary 
voice  of  Patrick  Henry  to  dispel  the  doubts  and  fears, 
put  to  shame  the  cowardice  and  move  to  action  a  people 
great  and  brave.  "They  tell  us  that  we  are  weak, 
unable  to  cope  with  so  formidable"  a  problem,  "But 
when  shall  we  be  stronger?"  Will  it  be  the  next  year 
or  the  next  century,  will  it  be  when  this  stronghold  of 
learning  is  deserted?  Will  it  be  when  generations  of 
untutored  men  have  worn  the  chains  of  ignorance  from 
the  cradle  to  the  grave?  "Sir,  we  are  not  weak,  if 
we  make  the  proper  use  of  those  means  which  the  God 
of  Nature  has  placed  into  our  power".  Two  millions 
of  people  guided  by  the  light  of  liberty  and  learning, 
and  sustained  by  the  resources  of  such  a  State  as  that 


10 

which  we  possess,  are  equal  to  any  task  which  destiny 
and  duty  have  set  before  them.  Besides,  sir,  the  State 
is  not  to  fig-ht  this  battle -alone.  The  spirit  of  that 
lowly,  lotty  Teacher  which  sustained  Paul  at  the 
Ar<"opao-us,  christianized  the  pag-an  Greek  and  Roman, 
and  the  barbarous  Gaul  and  Teuton,  has  moulded 
modern  law  and  stimulated  modern  institutions.  Chris- 
tianity is  the  influence  of  Christ.  Blackstone  and 
Webster,  Kent  and  Storey  have  pronounced  it  a  part 
of  our  common  law.  It  came  not  to  destroy  but  to 
save.  It  influences  every  function  of  g-overnment,  it 
usurps  none.  By  scattering-  the  huddling-  classes  and 
teaching-  the  brotherhood  of  man,  capital  has  been 
clothed  with  a  sacred  trust  and  philanthropy  has  come 
into  the  world.  Beautiful  and  sublime  is  philanthropy 
in  all  of  its  forms,  beautiful  those  benefactions,  thoug-h 
desig-ned  to  write  our  creed  on  other  men's  souls, 
which  have  sown  the  soil  with  sectarian  schools.  But 
more  beautiful  and  more  sublime  is  that  form  of  phil- 
anthrophy  which  gives  like  God  gives  the  sun-shine. 
No  name  is  so  certain  to  be  spoken,  no  name  so  sweet 
to  the  lips  of  fame,  no  name  so  independent  of  monu- 
mental marble,  as  the  name  of  him  who  by  g-enerous 
g-iving-  has  touched  the  great  heart  of  mankind.  It 
was  not  ur.til  Mark  Antony,  that  masterful  mover  of 
multitudes,  had  reached  the  last  clause  of  Causer's 
will,  and  above  the  din  of  the  forum,  shouted: 

"To  every  Roman  Citizen  he  Gives, 

To  every  eeveral  man  seventy-five  drachmas, 

His  private  arbors  and  new  planted  orchards  on  this  side  Tiber," 

it  was  not  till  he  had  struck  this  master  chord  of  the 
human  breast  that  he  roused  the  Roman  rabble  to 
relentless  revenge.  When  Alexander  the  Great  died, 
his  faith  !ul  generals  consumed  two  years  in  starting- 
his  funer'dl  car  laden    with  rich  trapping-s  of  the  orient 


11 

and  drawn  by  sixty  steeds  ot  stainless  white  from  the 
Euphrates  to  the  Nile.  The  solemn  pa.ii"eant  made  its 
way  amid  men  with  hearts  as  barren  and  eyes  as  dry 
as  the  sand-drifted  deserts  over  which  it  passed, — 
evokin«'  no  cry  save  from  the  stariled  slave  wdio  asked 
for  the  name  of  his  new  master.  When  Gcorg-e  Pea- 
body  died,  the  British  Empire  and  the  American 
Republic  sent  the  proudest  battle  ships  and  flag  ships 
of  their  great  navies  to  bear  his  sarcophagus  in  triumph 
across  the  sea — fit  emblem  of  his  x\potheosis,  when  his 
great  soul  sailed  away  on  an  ocean  of  tears.  His  phil- 
anthropy had  astonished  the  world,  and  his  death 
touched  to  tenderness  and  to  tears  the  great  heart  of 
humanity,  and  the  English  speaking  people  stood  un- 
covered in  awful  veneration  at  his  bier.  By  the  phil- 
anthropy of  a  few  self-sacrificing  men  and  women,  poor 
in  purse  but  rich  in  human'  sympathy  and  by  the 
munificence  of  the  public,  we  have  here  the  true  foun- 
dations of  a  higher  learning.  In  spirit  a  University 
always;  but  in  arts  and  implements  the  centur3''s  dawn 
found  it  a  school,  the  meridian  marked  it  a  college,  the 
setting  sun  casts  its  mantle  of  glowing  light  upon  a 
University,  strong  in  its  deep-rooted  traditions  and 
affections,  vital  with  new  life,  vigorous  in  its  new 
growth.  It  is  the  true  type,  it  is  the  result  of  growth 
under  the  latest  and  best  husbandry.  It  is  the  Ameri- 
can stock  ingrafted  with  the  German  scion,  giving  the 
depth  of  German  thought  the  breadth  of  American 
culture,  and  scattering  its  rich  fruitage  not  beyond 
the  people  but  amongst  the  people;  teaching  the  few, 
enlightening  the  many ;  smiting  the  rock  and  sending 
from  the  mountain  side  to  the  plain  level  below  a 
fountain  of  knowledge  pure  and  bright  as  sparkling 
water.  Its  power  is  already  felt  under  every  school 
house  that    "Nestles  in  our    happy  valleys  and  crowns 


12 

our  swelling-  hills". 

Shall  it  endure?  I  appeal  to  the  alumni,  you  who 
adorn  the  executive  chair,  the  senate  hall,  the  desk, 
the  field,  the  forum,  the  market,  the  ermine  and  the 
g'own, — passing-  from  triumph  to  triumph,  b}^  force  of 
the  intellectual  prowess  which  draws  its  inspiration 
from  her  breast  and  stamping-  her  irapremater  upon 
all  that  is  lofty  in  thoug^ht,  courag"eous  in  action, 
sublime  in  devotion. 

I  appeal  to  the  patriotic  citizens,  burdened  by  an 
industrial  domination  and  debased  by  an  intellectual 
domination  of  the  North,  who  have  paid  your  quota  of 
the  five  millions  of  dollars  sent  annually  from  the 
South  to  help  Northern  schools  perpetuate  your  sub- 
jection to  their  thoug-ht,  who  pay  for  education  a  sum 
if  utilized  and  kept  at  home  would  g-ive  us  a  University 
and  a  system  of  schools  equal  to  the  best  in  New 
Kng-land,  superior  to  the  best  in  the  New  South. 

I  appeal  to  North  Carolina,  and  ask  if  this  University 
shall  endure?  You  may  disown  your  child,  you  ma}^ 
strike  her  dov^^n,  but  when  you  do,  you  strike  down  the 
one  that  has  written  your  name  the  highest,  — the  one 
that  loves  3^ou  best. 

But  this  is  no  time  for  foreboding*.  A  political  rev- 
olution has  just  swept  over  our  State.  Three  currents 
of  political  thoug-ht  divergfing"  and  seeking-  opposite 
poles  till  they  touched  the  head  and  heart  of  the 
people's  schools,  when  one  time  at  least  they  rushed 
together  in  warm  embrace.  It  is  secure!  Local  jeal- 
ousy and  sectarian  strife  may  hock  at  and  deride  it, 
blind  fanaticism  and  time-serving  demagogary  may 
mock  and  menace  its  career,  but  the  people  will  not  be 
deceived.  Their  eyes  are  turned  with  hope  and  their 
ears  with  faith  to  George  T.  Winston  whom  the  public 
voice  has    hailed    the    most   fit    to    lead    forth  the  best 


13 

thoug"ht  of  the  nineteenth  century  to  another  and  a 
more  forward  ag^e.  Trusting-  to  him  to  seize  this  op- 
portunity of  the  ag'es,  to  take  the  forward  step  upon 
the  smooth  highway  of  triumphant  civilization  over 
which  the  New  South — *'Catching"  the  gieam  that  died 
on  our  father's  swords"  to  light  up  the  path-wa}^  of 
their  sons,  nerved  by  necessity,  pushed  on  by  poverty, 
bouyant  with  the  inspiration  of  hope  which  none  but  the 
young-  and  poor  can  feel,  dow^ered  by  the  discipline  of 
a  Titanic  strug-g-le,  and  fired  by  faith  in  the  dynamic 
energies  of  her  nevv  growth — shall  press  forward  and 
onward  until  the  achievements  of  the  past  are  eclipsed 
by  the  miracles  of  the  future  and  the  darkness  of  war 
and  w^aste  shall  burst  into  the  white  splendors  of  per- 
petual peace  and  power. 

It  is  this  new  g-rowth,  this  truly  American  org-anism, 
this  ideal  head  and  heart  of  the  new  life  of  the  people, 
this  spirit  of  the  New  University,  "That  is  worthy  to 
lead  forth  into  expression  this  g-rand  new  life  of  the 
western  world  whose  pulsations  are  richer  with  possi- 
bilities than  those  of  ancient  Greece  and  Rome".  Their 
fabled  charioteer  of  the  sun  is  not  unlike  the  enlig-h- 
tened  man  of  our  thrilling-  day — enthroned  on  the  car 
of  progress  with  the  lines  of  science  in  his  hands, 
g-uiding-  the  rushing-  winds  as  they  carry  him  from 
continent  to  continent,  g^oading  the  tireless  steam  as  it 
plows  the  ocean  and  the  land,  and  with  the  lig'htning' 
lash  dashing  his  commands  around  the  world. 

Standing-  here  betvv'een  the  two  g^randest  centuries 
of  all  time,  upon  the  cap  stone  of  the  Old  University, 
upon  the  portals  of  the  New,  the  heirs  of  one  g-reat 
event,  the  witnesses  of  another,  bivouaced  by  the  shin- 
ing path-way  of  our  history  to  hear  the  century  roll- 
call  of  names  though  whose  white  lips  memory  breaths 
an  eloquent  echo  of  virtue  and  valor,  let  us  drink  deep 


14 

the  inspiration  of  this  great  day.  And  for  the  liberty 
we  love,  the  learning-  we  honor,  the  relig^ion  we  hallow, 
let  us  go  forward  till  the  ideals  of  our  fathers'  are 
realized;  till  the  prayers  of  the  old  and  the  hopes  of 
the  young-  are  fulfilled;  till  all  science,  all  art,  all 
truth — nurseling's  of  the  fuller  civilization — are  nour- 
ished at  her  breast;  till  the  radius  of  her  lig-ht  is 
pushed  across  the  dim  border  land  of  finite  matter  and 
infinite  mind;  till  the  jarg-on  of  nations,  the  raillery  of 
races,  the  war  of  creeds  are  stilled — and  the  pall  of 
ig-norance  is  lifted  up,  and  lig-ht  covers  the  land  like  a 
mantle. 


K 


